


Danzetsu

by uumuu



Series: Fëanorians in Valinor [10]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 18:22:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18078635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uumuu/pseuds/uumuu
Summary: Fëanor shows Caranthir a portrait of his grandmother.





	Danzetsu

“This is what your grandmother looked like,” his father said softly.

Carnistir, sitting in his father's lap, firmly grasped the portrait his father was holding before his face. He studied it in silence, except for the noises little Curufinwë made while he played in his safe corner on the other side of the room. 

Grandmother wore a faint smile in the portrait, and her eyes were terribly life-like.

“She would have loved you,” his father said with the same gentle voice, only that it sounded suddenly brittle. He wrapped his arms around Carnistir. “You take so much after her.”

His father was right. Indis was nice and kind, but her eyes were too big and her face too long. Míriel's face had the same shape as Carnistir's own, framed by silver hair identical to Tyelcormo's. Her skin was as dark as his father's. Her eyes were the most beautiful thing: they were black, and were the same shape of Carnistir's eyes, too. Carnistir felt a sense of deep familiarity just looking at them. Looking at them made him even prouder of his father-name, of all that he had inherited from his grandmother's side of the family. 

“She would have been happy to teach you.” 

Carnistir nodded. 

“I will try to do my best, but after I teach you the basics grandmother's handmaidens will have to take over, okay?”

Carnistir again nodded, still staring at the portrait. He was almost sorry for asking his father to teach him to crochet and knit, for making a fuss and insisting until his father said yes. 

Maitimo had tried to tell him how much it hurt their father to even think of grandmother.

Maitimo himself had looked incredibly sad as he went on to explain why exactly their grandmother was forbidden to ever change her mind about returning, and Carnistir was sure there was something Maitimo had not been willing to elaborate on. 

“Now, let's start,” Fëanáro said, trying to sound cheerful and not entirely succeeding. Before he could pick up the crochet hook and yarn he had prepared, however, Curufinwë started wailing as one of his toys fell over the coloured bars that fenced his playground. 

Fëanáro stood up, gently settled Carnistir on the armchair and went over to check on him.

Carnistir was left alone with his grandmother's portrait.

After a while, he thought he began to see the same veil of sadness in her eyes that he sometimes saw in his father's. He looked up. Fëanáro had given Curufinwë his toy back, and was cuddling him to calm him down. 

Without even realising it, Carnistir fell into a reverie. His grandmother was there, and he sat in her lap while she taught him everything he wanted to learn, better than anybody else could have taught him. His father was playing with Curufinwë and he smiled at them, and there wasn't that veil of sadness over his eyes that made Carnistir so uncomfortable.

Then suddenly the picture changed, and in his father's place was a man with the wrong eyes and the wrong hair and the wrong face. A man who could never ever be his father or take his place. 

He started to tremble and a sob escaped his lips. 

Fëanáro turned. His eyebrows knit together in a pained expression and he hastened to lower Curufinwë back inside in his playground.

“Shhh, Moryo, it's okay,” he said, striding towards him. 

Carnistir held his hands out and gratefully clung to his father as Fëanáro gathered him in his arms and sat down on the armchair again. The next second he realised he didn't know where Míriel's portrait was – if it had ended up crumpled between their bodies of if it had fallen on the floor – but he didn't want to pull back from the warmth of his father's chest and arms. 

“It's okay, Moryo, everything is fine. I will not go away like Mother did,” his father whispered, caressing his head. “I'm never going to leave you.”

Carnistir would have liked to trust his father, but he felt like a hungry void had suddenly opened up inside his chest and he was never going to be able to fill it up again. 

Years later, when they had to tell Curufinwë about Míriel, he understood what that void was, what Maitimo had not been able to explain: there was no facing their grandmother's death without becoming familiar with the concept of loss, without starting to fear loss.

“Your brothers were afraid too, but here I am.” 

The mention of his brothers finally calmed Carnistir down a little. His mind frantically latched onto it. His father had been alone when his mother died, and had been very young. But Carnistir had three older brothers and was not so young. He pulled his face away from his father's chest. 

His father kissed his forehead, bestowing the most tender smile on him. 

Carnistir made a promise to himself that very instant: he would always take care of his father. He was not going to ever let anyone hurt his father again. He was not going to let anyone take his father away from him.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think the Sons' response to hearing about their grandmother's death was "ah ok, cool, no problem", I think they all ended up asking themselves at some point 'but what if the same thing happens to father?' (and they were so close to their father partly because they understood his fear of loss better than anybody else).


End file.
